The present invention relates generally to sheet delivering apparatus, and more specifically to apparatus for receiving sheets of corrugated paperboard or the like from a processing machine such as a printer-slotter and to transferring the sheets to another device such as a stacker. The invention relates more particularly to a device for effecting crosswise division of such sheets in the delivery thereof to the processing machine.
Known apparatus interposed between a processing machine and a succeeding device is usually no more than an ordinary belt conveyor. Such apparatus receives sheets permanently discharged from the machine, but is periodically stopped as may fit the needs of the succeeding device, for example, when a full stacker is exchanged for an empty one. The belt conveyor receives the sheets transferred from the continuously running machine and a disorderly overlapping on the stationary conveyor belt will occur. This leads to disadvantages in that the disordered reserved or accumulated sheets on the conveyor belt require labor and time to be rearranged before restarting the conveyor to avoid problems in the succeeding device. Another disadvantage is that, when a sheet is divided in the machine, precise separation, particularly longitudinal separation can not be achieved in the known apparatus with the result that a troublesome manual operation is needed for longitudinal separation of each sheet.
It is the primary object of this invention to provide an improved delivering apparatus in which sheets are temporarily reserved or accumulated in order and precisely separated, if required, while being conveyed from a processing machine to another device.